


Mano Dura, Cabeza, y Corazón

by shadydave



Series: Love is All You Need to Destroy Your Enemies [1]
Category: The Dresden Files - Jim Butcher, Welcome to Night Vale
Genre: Deleted Scenes, Gen, Journalism, ROAD TRIP WHOOOOOOOOOOOOO, Special Vampire Correspondent
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-16
Updated: 2015-01-16
Packaged: 2018-03-07 18:56:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,187
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3179483
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shadydave/pseuds/shadydave
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Journalism will kill you, but it will keep you alive while you're at it." – Horace Greeley</p>
<p>Takes place after Chapter 1 of <a href="http://archiveofourown.org/works/2207475/chapters/4837680">Love is All You Need to Destroy Your Enemies</a> and before <i>White Night</i>, although who am I to tell you to read things in order.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Mano Dura, Cabeza, y Corazón

Carlos was eighteen the first time he fought a vampire of the Red Court, only a few months out of training. He’s fought dozens of them since then – maybe even hundreds – but he’s never really forgotten the sight and sound and smell of beautiful human skin tearing away to reveal a hideous, blood-sucking monster, strobe lights reflecting off black claws, the panicked screams of a crowd-turned-stampede, the miasma of hot blood and spilled alcohol and way too much cheap body spray. It’s definitely put him off clubbing, probably forever. 

So he’s not wildly enthused about being stuck in a Jeep with two not- _quite_ -vampire members of the Fellowship of St. Giles. Yes, they’ve so far kept their humanity by refusing to give in to the bloodlust of the creatures that bit them. Yes, they’re one of the White Council’s greatest allies in the war with the Red Court. But their joint op ended in a literal bloodbath and even though everyone has cleaned up as best they can, even Carlos can still smell the metallic tang. He is very aware that he couldn’t be more appetizing to two half-starved, adrenaline-filled almost-vampires if he slathered himself with cheese and rolled up in a burrito.

Well, no. He could be more appetizing if he had also passed out from exhaustion and was lying in the back seat looking limp and edible, but Meyers has got that covered.

Susan is watching him again. She has his vote if they're going to get eaten, since she's hot and likes to crack jokes in the middle of a fight and most importantly would probably feel a little bad about it afterwards. Her partner is so bland Carlos doubts he could pick him out of a crowd even though they're fleeing to the Guatemalan border together, and he has yet to see... Marvin? Marlon? make any facial expression beyond "impassive" and "impassively suppressed bloodlust". If Buffalo Bill’s going to insist on being unconscious, it's only fair Carlos gets first dibs on their untimely demise.

But Carlos hasn't given up just yet. He leans back against the side of the Jeep and puts his feet up on Bill, arms crossed casually, trying to project the relaxed confidence of a fellow predator. Like he's ready to go another twelve rounds with the _murciélagos_ and show the rookies how to blow up some rocks before cooking an eight-course meal, instead of desperately wanting to crawl into a bathtub and listen to the radio while curled up in a ball. He gives Susan his cockiest grin and asks, "Are we there yet?"

She stares at him a moment, her eyes wide and dark and unblinking. Then the corner of her mouth twitches and she says, "Don't make me turn this car around." The darkness retreats from her eyes until human-looking pupils and irides reappear; the tattoos on her face lighten as she regains some control. She faces forward in her seat and lets out a deep breath.

"We're less than a half-mile from the border," says Marvin. Wait, 'Marvin' doesn't sound right, dammit. "After that, the extraction point is—"

He stops talking as they round a curve in the road. They are indeed less than a half-mile from the border, as it's just past the checkpoint station that has apparently materialized in the last two days outside of the knowledge of their local contacts.

“I see five men,” says Susan. “Should we try it?”

Marlon – no, that's not right either – slows the Jeep a little and says, “There’s another five inside. Could be close.”

Susan turns to Carlos. “Can either of you shield us?”

Carlos is exhausted from the raid on the Red Court’s compound, but he's had enough of a rest that there’s a chance he could be useful. The same can’t be said for Meyers. "Bill gets cranky when you interrupt his beauty sleep," he says. "I could hold off fire provided they only have small arms, but I’m worried I’d knock out the engine.”

“If we make too much noise, the Red Court will be all over this area,” says Marshall (?). “Our extraction plan will be useless.”

“Dammit,” mutters Susan. “All right, we’ll stop and talk our way through.”

Definitely-not-Marshall gives her an inscrutable look, but brakes until Jeep rolls to a halt just outside the checkpoint.

Two guards approach, guns up.

“Hands where we can see them,” says one.

“Our friend is sick,” says Carlos. He nods towards Meyers while keeping his hands above his head.

“We’re with the documentary crew at Chinkultic,” says Susan. “We left to get help.”

One of the guards shakes his head. “You should have gone back to Comitán. I can’t let you across the border without proper authorization.”

“I have my press credentials,” says Susan.

The guard hesitates, then shakes his head. “I—”

He's interrupted by the radio hissing and spitting to life. He tenses, hands tightening around his sidearm. 

“Look both ways before crossing the street,” says Cecil. The guard narrows his eyes and Carlos suppresses a groan, because now is really not the moment for his death curse to make friends with the locals. 

“Look both ways before crossing your eyes,” Cecil continues. 

“Wait,” says Susan. “Is that—”

“Look both ways before crossing the line,” says Cecil. “Welcome... to _Night Vale_.”

“Oh, my God,” says the other guard. “I love this show!”

~*~*~*~

Half an hour later – roughly – the entire border patrol station has gathered around their Jeep and Carlos has talked himself hoarse translating.

“Thank you,” says one of the guards over the closing music. “We haven’t heard a new episode in _weeks_. We can’t pick up the broadcasts out here.”

“It’s nothing,” says Carlos.

“I want to go there,” says another guard. “I mean, not permanently, that sounds too dangerous. Just for a visit.”

“I liked the old announcer better,” says a third guard crabbily, and Carlos feels entirely vindicated when he’s shouted down by several of the others.

“So,” says Carlos. “We should really get our friend to a doctor.”

“Well…” says the first guard, wavering.

“You know,” says Susan, “I’m actually a special correspondent for _The_ _Night Vale Daily Journal_.”

“You are?” says the guard.

“You are?” says Carlos.

“And a personal friend of Leann Hart,” says Susan. “We’re trying to break a story on the real builders of the pyramids. But Bill here is our only bloodstone technician, and—”

“Oh, why didn’t you say?” the guard replies, and five minutes later they’re a mile down the road, a thousand dollars in bribes lighter, but richer in freedom, anonymity, and a complimentary box of campaign buttons for the presidential run of the brigadier general, who is also apparently a big fan.

“...What just happened?” asks Marcus. He sounds tense. And not at all like a Marcus. Maury? Morris?

But he's asking a very good question, because while Cecil’s broadcast had covered the minutes of last night’s PTA meeting, the latest drawbridge collapse, and an interview with Sarah Sultan, the new president of Night Vale Community College and also a fist-sized smooth river rock, it had not actually mentioned _The Night Vale Daily Journal_ , Leann Hart, _or_ bloodstones.

“I told you we’d talk our way through,” says Susan.

"Where did that radio broadcast come from?"

"Magic," says Carlos, and Susan's mouth twitches again. “You’ve been to Night Vale?” he asks her.

“Right before we went to Chicago, when you were on that job in El Salvador, Martin." Martin! That was it. "I didn’t realize the White Council had a presence there.”

“We keep an eye on it,” says Carlos nonchalantly. “What happened?”

“I was following rumors of the ‘Brigadoon of the Southwest’,” she says, finger quotes and all. “I headed for the area with the highest rate of unexplained disappearances and drove right into it. The whole place was a mess – the library was on fire, a blob of glup was rampaging through the streets, the City Council had evacuated to Vegas…”

“Just your average Tuesday, huh?” asks Carlos.

“So I was told,” she says, and grins – a real grin, not just unnervingly bared teeth. “I tried to keep my head down, but Leann Hart conscripted me to the Daily Journal’s citizen army after I lifted a street cleaner off her. I didn’t mind helping, though, and she set up a couple interviews for me as repayment. Cecil was one of the reporters I pulled out of the blob of glup – I think he was just an intern, then. But he has a memorable voice. And memorable eyes.”

Carlos feels a twinge of something unidentifiable; he’s never been close enough to Cecil to find out what makes his eyes so memorable. 

Martin grunts. “Any potential for a safehouse?” he asks.

Susan snorts. “It’s not _remotely_ safe,” she says. "But it was..."

"Weirdly nice?" says Carlos, after her pause stretches on.

"Yes," she agrees. "Charming, in a horrifying kind of way."

"Great place to raise a kid, provided they can make it to adulthood," says Carlos.

"Dangerous," says Martin.

Susan's grin fades; she stares out the open side of the Jeep into the deepening twilight. "There were monsters everywhere," she says. "I fit right in." When Martin doesn't respond, she looks at him and continues, "It was a lot easier to remember how to be human when I didn't have to pretend to be one."

Martin grunts again, and Susan falls silent as she settles back in her seat, but Carlos can't help but notice that their tattoos have almost completely faded.

~*~*~*~

They reach the extraction point unmolested. Carlos hangs back with the now-snoring Meyers as Martin radios for a chopper; they already lost the lights and power steering on the Jeep to bad wizard mojo, although that didn't prove much of a problem for a driver with more-than-human strength who could see in the dark.

Susan joins him, leaning against the hood of the Jeep. He wonders if she intentionally made sure he was out of reach.

"Night Vale was the last story I ever broke," she says. "I'd almost forgotten."

"You're a reporter?"

"I was," she says. "It was nice to talk to some fellow professionals one last time – well, once Leann put her axe away, at least. They were an... interesting bunch."

"That's the one thing I've never understood," says Carlos. "I've seen people there literally stick their heads – and _other_ people's heads – in the sand to avoid learning something that could save their lives, but they've got more reporters than actual news organizations to support them. Why are there so many people asking questions when the answers are only going to bring them trouble?"

“The thrill of intellectual pursuit,” says Susan. She looks a little nostalgic. “Defiance of danger. And because that's what makes us human. Or mostly human.” 

"What do you mean?"

"You know what the most important thing I've learned about vampires is?" asks Susan. "They don't change. They can't. Oh, they can mimic the thoughts and strategies and desires they had before they turned." Her lips twist. "And they can corrupt others into their likeness. But they're too steeped in death to give life to something new. After thousands of years, they're still lurking in the shadows of humanity. The darkness may grow, but their place hasn't changed."

Carlos crosses his arms and leans back against the Jeep. "So... life is about change. That makes sense. It's the root of the laws of entropy, the whole concept of free will." 

Susan nods. "When faced with the unknown, everyone has a choice," she says. "Hold on to the known, or forge blindly ahead. The former you can control to a certain extent; the latter, sometimes the only thing to control is yourself. And when almost everything is beyond your control already, well, what do you have to lose by asking a few questions? Sometimes the first step to changing the world is changing what's inside your head."

"And then someone else's," says Carlos. After a moment, he adds, "You're still pretty good at that, you know."

"I was lead reporter on a yellow rag," she says. "Now I'm a guerilla freedom fighter. I think I've probably changed the world more with the hands-on approach."

"That you know of," he says, because if she hadn't gone to Night Vale all those years ago, she couldn't have saved Cecil from the blob of glup, and Cecil couldn't have saved Carlos from his death curse, and his death curse couldn't have saved them from getting arrested by the Guatemalan Border Police and then probably eaten by vampires, and the world would be down four of the people most qualified to save it. And that was just one tiny cross-section of all their actions in all their lives... “A small change in initial conditions can result in large differences in a later state.”

She raises an eyebrow. 

“The butterfly effect,” he says. “Who knows who'll read your stuff and what they’ll do with it?”

She tips her head back and looks at the stars, or maybe at the void between them, and says, “I hope they think it’s worth it, too.”

**Author's Note:**

> Still plugging away on the next chapter(s), but have this deleted scene! It's slightly non-canonical in that Central/South America is not one vast mass of nigh-apocalyptic terror populated only by vampires and their victims, because what the hell, Jim Butcher.

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [[Podfic] Mano Dura, Cabeza, y Corazón](https://archiveofourown.org/works/11188572) by [shadydave](https://archiveofourown.org/users/shadydave/pseuds/shadydave), [Subsequent](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Subsequent/pseuds/Subsequent)




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